Bring NBA but don’t use public $$$: Poll

Seattle and King County officials have become out-front boosters of a new NBA-NHL arena in Sodo, but a new Elway Poll carries a message from the public: Not on our dime.

The independent pollster posed questions to 201 Seattle voters and 207 from outside the city in King County, even though these citizens will likely never get to vote on the proposed 18,000-seat, $490 million arena.

Fifty-seven percent of King County respondents and 48 percent of those surveyed in the Emerald City said they would favor bringing the National Basketball Assn. back to Seattle and having a National Hockey League team playing (and fighting) here.

When asked if public money should be risked building the arena where these teams would play, however, support levels fell to 30 percent (Seattle) and 33 percent (King County).

The poll was disclosed (initially in the Seattle Times) on the same day that Seattle Port Commission members directed a sharp, not-so-fast letter to the Seattle City Council.

They warned that the arena would be built cheek-to-jowl with a working waterfront in which daily traffic congestion in key Sodo intersections “already reaches unacceptable levels”.

“To date, the developer (Chris Hansen) has presented no compelling policy or business justification for urgent action on a proposal that has not been fully studied and that could weaken port/industrial businesses that support 33,000 jobs, provide one-third of Seattle’s retail tax revenue and generate $3 billion a year in revenue to the region,” the commissioners wrote.

“We would add that an assessment of the economic impacts on maritime commerce in the region, as well as on land use, also have not been developed,” they added.

The Elway Poll found that half of those surveyed, in both Seattle and King County, feel that Sodo is a good location to put an NHL-NBA arena.

But there is skepticism.

Elway gave those surveyed an either-or option, namely to invest taxpayer money or see no arena built: 61 percent of those polled in Seattle, and 54 percent in King County, opted for no arena.

Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn and King County Executive Dow Constantine, amidst much celebratory talk, last week signed a memorandum of understanding with Hansen that calls for public investment.

It stipulated that $290 million toward the arena’s cost would come from private sources, with the city’s investment capped at $120 million in bonds and the county’s at $80 million in bonds.